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Introduction

Far out in the icy waters of the North Sea
lies a tiny island that is home to one of the most terrible places on earth: Azkaban, the wizarding
prison (PA3,
Sch1).

Azkaban is a terrible place. Prisoners were for years guarded by
Dementors, horrible
creatures who have been described as "sightless soul-sucking fiends." They feed
on positive emotions, which means that after spending much time in the
prison, the prisoners lose all hope and all good feelings and thoughts.
They are forced to relive the darkest, most horrible memories
of their lives. Some go mad, others simply despair and die
(GF27).

During Voldemort's return to power, however, the dementors allowed the
escape of a number of Death Eaters (OP25) and then eventually deserted
Azkaban altogether to ally themselves with Voldemort (HBP1). After
Voldemort's defeat, new Minister for MagicKingsley Shacklebolt saw to
it that Dementors would no longer be involved in guarding Azkaban,
which despite making the atmosphere more plesant on the island, likely
prevents a number of problems as well (BLC).

Location

Because of a comment by Sirius Black
describing his escape from Azkaban, some have conjectured that the island
must really located farther south than the North Sea
location Rowling has described. Sirius
does state quite clearly that he swam to shore, then visited
Privet Drive before heading
north to Hogwarts
(PA22).
Privet Drive is in Surrey,
which is south of London. Since it is only
logical to assume that Sirius would
have swum to the nearest point on the mainland to Azkaban, that point must have been
somewhere in the English Channel between
England
and France.
Several fans have tried to come up with alternative locations which fit the bill.

Rowling, however, is very clear on the subject. Azkaban is far to the
north, and Sirius chose to travel to
Hogwarts with a detour
through Surrey.
That seems odd to us Muggles, but wizard ideas of "shortest route"
don't necessarily use the kind of geometry we Muggles take for granted. The
Knight Bus, for example, seems
to move between destinations almost in alphabetical order. This odd logic is similar
to that which makes Transfiguration
simpler when the two items have similar names (guinea pigs and guinea fowl).
Therefore we can't necessarily take Sirius'
offhand analysis of his trip and superimpose it over a Muggle map to figure
out where Azkaban is (Sch1)

Break-Outs

We know of at least four break-outs from Azkaban.
We have been led to believe that these are the only times this has ever
taken place, as Ron states clearly after
Sirius Black's break-out
that "no one's ever done it before" (PA5).
While this isn't quite true, it does seem likely that the break-outs we've heard of are all that exist.

Sirius Black - July 1993Cornelius Fudge came to visit Azkaban this summer,
and gave a copy of his Daily Prophetto
Sirius. On the front page, though, was a picture of the Weasley family
that included Ron's pet rat, Scabbers. What Sirius alone knew was that
Scabbers was actually an unregistered Animagus -
Peter Pettigrew - who
was also a Death Eater. An unregistered Animagus himself, Sirius
transformed into a dog when the Dementors brought him food; in this
state he was able to slip past them undetected and swim to shore (PA19).

Gaunt, Marvolo
Sent to Azkaban c. 1944 for attacking
Ministry
officials attempting to arrest his son. He was sentenced to six months
(HBP10).

Gaunt, Morfin
Sent to Azkaban for three years c. 1944 for the hexing of
Tom Riddle and
resisting arrest. After he returned from Azkaban, he was implicated in the deaths of the three inhabitants of the
Riddle House.
He readily confessed to the killings, but was actually innocent. His nephew,
the son of Tom Riddle
and Morfin's sister
Merope, actually
committed the murders and planted false memories in
Morfin's
mind. He died in Azkaban, firmly believing in his own guilt
(HBP17).

MulciberCaptured by the Ministry c. 1981 or earlier (GF30); escaped
during the mass breakout of January 1996 (see note under 'Break-Outs').
Sent back to Azkaban after his recapture June 1996 in the
Department of Mysteries
(OP35, OP36)
and presumably escaped a second time that summer (DH5).

Travers
Captured by the Ministry c. 1981 or earlier (GF30).
It is unknown whether he escaped as part of the mass break-out of 1996; if so, he was re-apprehended. Either way
he certainly escaped Azkaban in the summer of 1997, because according to
Kingsley Shacklebolt he was
"supposed to be inside" (DH5).

Dolores Umbridge
Following the defeat of Voldemort, Umbridge was "arrested,
interrogated, and imprisoned for crimes against Muggleborns" (BLC).

Yaxley
Arrested for breaking into Hogwarts in 1997; he almost certainly escaped
in the mass breakout that summer.

Through a little deductive logic we can determine that Yaxley was the unnamed
Death Eater who HarryStunned atop the
Astronomy Tower immediately following
Dumbledore's death. When Harry ran into Yaxley at the Ministry, he recognized
him as a Death Eater who had been present that night(DH12); meanwhile,
the only people on the tower when Dumbledore died were Dumbledore, Harry, Snape,
Draco Malfoy, Fenrir Greyback, the
Carrows, and the "brutal-faced" Death Eater
(HBP27) who Harry Stunned
(HBP28). Therefore, this Death Eater must have been Yaxley - and
Rufus Scrimgeour later told Harry that the Ministry had discovered that Death
Eater, and presumably arrested him (HBP30).